Space Jump

19.5 miles is the highest a human being has ever successfully skydived from, in 1960. Skydiving daredevil Felix Baumgartner of Austria is attempting to break the record by aiming to jump from 23 miles. He did his practice jump of 13.5 miles over New Mexico, from his capsule which was carried by a hot-air balloon. Yeah, me too, I was thinking 'hot-air balloon??'. Definitely some high-tech balloon and not those that we are familiar with, which flies over Safaris so we can spot an elephant or giraffe.

Look at this picture, it looks more like space to me. It doesn't even look real!

Why the space suit? Apparently at this distance away from Earth, there is virtually no atmosphere and would be hostile to humans- hence the pressure suit and air supply. It's good to know that free fall does not depend on mass, if not this will be hell of a fast jump with all that weight.



The current record holder who jumped from 19 miles above, half a century ago, must have had a whole truck of balls. I cannot imagine the type of machine that flew him that high or the type of parachute which he tied his life to. >.<